Two school-boys are part of a strong senior Western Province 13-man squad that was announced for the Africa T20 Cup on Monday.

Bonga Makaka made his first-class debut at age 17 last season against the Northern Cape. Jonathan Bird was a standout performer in the South African U19 team’s first series win against England in Youth One Day Internationals since 2003 on English soil.

The team consists of several big hitters who can ignite a ground with their vast array of attacking shots. Janneman Malan and Bird are potential openers who are blessed with talent and Big Match temperament to produce the goods for Western Province in the tournament from 14th to 16th September in Pietermaritzburg.

The fast bowling resources are also quite exciting. Proteas and World Sports Betting Cape Cobras strike bowler, Dane Paterson, will lead an attack which also contains another two potential match-winners in Michael Cohen and Mpilo Njoloza.

Kyle Williamson is a leg-spinner who has excelled at club level in the Western Province and who possesses the variations to bamboozle a batting line up.

Clinton du Preez, manager of cricket services of the Western Province Cricket Association, was upbeat about the balance of youth and experience in the team.

He added that since the inception of the Africa Cup competition, Western Province has had poor results and they would like to turn the corner this season.

“The preparation has been great and we will be playing a few warm-up games. This time around we will have the opportunity to play some pre-tournament games,” he adds.

The team will travel to Durban to play two warm-up games there, while eight other pre-tournament T20 matches will be played before their Group A games start on 14th September.

“This year we are going to compete and push on for the semi and finals weekend. It is great to see players selected from our selected Club XI who played a few games last season, this is encouraging for all club cricketers who will have the confidence to access the high performance pipeline straight from the club cricket scene,” he said in alluding to the inclusion of Williamson.

Western Province head coach Paul Adams is enthusiastic about the inclusion of other African countries in the tournament. “It is great to see Cricket South Africa at the forefront in growing the game of cricket within the African continent.

“We will be preparing differently to previous seasons and with the challenge of the winter conditions down in the Western Cape we are wanting to think out of the box regarding simulating match conditions,” Adams said.

“We are also very keen to see some young players perform under pressure in games and continue to develop our high performance pipeline players,” Adams remarked.

The Western Province squad includes at least three classical all-rounders who are equally well-equipped to take four wickets or score 50 runs in André Malan, Dayyaan Galiem and George Linde.

WP will contest Pool A against KwaZulu-Natal Inland, KwaZulu-Natal Coastal, Easterns and Uganda.